Visit to chez Martins

This weekend I had the pleasure of popping in to meet MartinC in his Bath home and having a listen to his rather good system.

The background to this was a Tentlabs clock upgrade to my Meridian 500 transport, which Martin was kind enough to build and fit for me. As I'm far from an electronics expert, having someone who clearly knows what he's doing working on the job left me a LOT more confident.

Prior to the upgrade, we started with a quick side by side comparison of my Meridian 500 and Bel Canto DAC2 versus Martin's modded Naim CDI (well I think it's a CDI). These were fed via some DPA amps into his Impulse H2 speakers. After hearing how good RobH's H2s are when fed with a good signal, I was certainly looking forward to it. RobH's system is now probably one of the best home systems I've ever heard, amazing dynamics and coherence across the whole range.
Starting with my own transport/DAC combo, actually sounded a little too laid back and a trifle soggy. The modded CDI is clearly a better synergistic combination with his DPA amps, as they sounded brilliant on most things we tried, the only possible exception being a crowded house CD, on which I felt that things were just a little strident in places. Overall, brilliant.

Following the work, we didn't have quite as much time as I would have liked, but found the upgraded transport/DAC combo to be pretty much rejuvenated. Less soggy, and whilst not tiring, definitely more lifelike.
So my deepest thanks to Martin, who was not only very kind in helping on the upgrade, but also a wonderful host for giving us a brief tour of the central area of Bath.

Post the drive back to London, it was then time to see how the upgrade came across with my Bel Canto2i amp and Impulse Lali speakers (which are smaller and younger cousins to the H2s). I had a small area of concern that the "loss of sogginess" in Martin's system might translate into a "spot of hardness" in my own. The good news is that my fears were definitely not confirmed. The changes were actually rather hard to describe in hi-fi terms, so I'll not bother. What seemed to improve was the feeling of being in a smokey jazz cafe, beer on the table and some great music emanating from the stage, which was around 7-8 metres away. To me, when a system does that, and does it well, then it's doing it's job.


One edit for this post. The tentlabs clock is a £50 upgrade. I had done some reading around on the net regarding options, and Trichord seemed to come top of the list. The only issue with that is that the full version of clock and "Never Connected" PSU is going on for £400. Whilst it may well be slightly better, I'd struggle to believe it's THAT much better.

 

wow ...look forward to hearing this !

 

Hi Mike,

Glad to hear that the mods went ok and that you are enjoying the results. Sorry that I couldn't make it to Bath at the weekend - the dreaded flu struck

Martins clock (the Flea) is stunning at £50 and has the bonus of being extremely small so you can sneak it into the most cramped of players.

I got similar results fitting the flea to my Sony 3000ES but have now also joined the Meridian club and plan to give it fleas very soon

regards

 

Rob>
Was looking forward to seeing you there also.
Maybe we can catch up once you've modded your 506. I'm curious to hear how good it is, as I was impressed by your ES.

Looks like Martin might be coming over to the Heathrow show. Zanash and myself intend to go. Fancy joining us?

 

Yup - I'll be there!

The player is an elderly 206 - smacks the ES around the head even in standard form.

 

It was good to meet you again Mike, glad to hear the effort was worthwhile once you got home.

My player's actually a CD2, and I'd agree on the disc you mention (though it was Lloyd Cole's Rattlesnakes)- which is a pretty strident mix, though full of great music.

For everyone else - the install was pretty straightforward. I 'd already built and tested the clock and regulator board (flea), so it was just a matter of installing a small separate transformer for the clock, removing the existing crystal and 'tank' caps and feeding in the new signal. It would have helped if I'd remembered to actually complete the last step before switch-on and wondering why the thing didn't instantly spring to life. Oops; so it goes 2mins later all was singing and dancing.

Since Mr Sukebe and partner were staying over in Brissol for the night, they kindly left the Meridian and Belcanto dac with me overnight to enjo^^^^ keep an eye on and make sure all was well. Very enjoyable it was too - slightly less explicit perhaps than my player, as Mike puts it more of a mid-hall sound (rather than the 'stage edge' presentation I'm used to) with a fine full and weighty balance. As for comparisons with Rob's setup, I think that no valves and the fact I have the H2s well off the wall makes the general balance slightly tighter/ more forward anyway.

I'm definitely up for a bash at Heathrow - and I'll look forward to seeing you another time, Rob (hope the 'flu has gone away).

 

Lol when I put my Monarchy Audio Class A amp in to Robs system it made it sound more relaxed and laid back! I'm not sure that valve amp of Robs has the commonly referred to 'valve' sound.

 

Impulse

Incredible, four Impulse users in one thread!!! I've had my Lalis for a couple of months now. The midrange clarity and dynamics are outstanding, but in my fairly small room, the lower-bass was boomy, which was cancelling the mid/upper-bass. Even pulling them clear of walls made no real difference. However, after experimenting with stuffing, I've now achieved good tight bass by stuffing the top of the horn mouth with Decron.

 

I have to say that I've been quite surprised at the variance in presentation styles between valve amps, seems to be much wider than the variance in solid state kit. At Heathrow this year, I was astounded by the number of new valve amps, and more so at how thin and weedy most sounded. The on the other hand, Robs WAD combo now sounds amazing (can't say I thought that last year) and I really rate some of the Border Patrol stuff.

 

You should hear some H2s or Taus. The Lali's are MUCH more forgiving than the H2s, but driven well, the H2s are awesome.
I'll be experimenting some more soon with a Behringer 2496, could be interesting.
Where in the country are you and what are you driving yours with?

 

No, it certainly doesn't - it's much better than that! However - the Deltec DPA50s is a control freak in comparison

 

I'm in Paris I'm driving them with a pair of Flying Mole DAD-M100pro monoblocks.

 

It replaced a Naim NAP180 and sounds tighter with better controled at the bottom - not what you'd expect at all. I've been saying that to anyone who'll listen for 18 months now and I'm sure they think I'm a fruit loop or been at the whacky-backy

I'm sure that KT88s and big output transformers that can swing the full output 20-20 are the main reason. Flat earth tubes rule

Looking forward to that. Flu is much better and my ears have returned to normal today.

Stuffing the horn isn't ideal as it can also make the sound muddled and constricted IMO. Speak to Simon about bass traps

 

Yes I agree, no stuffing is generally better for most horn designs, but Lalis are folded Voigt Pipes, which are notorious for bass related problems IMO, judicious stuffing can help eliminate any half wavelength standing waves in these designs without compromising dynamics too much. After much experimentation, I'm now getting a fairly even frequency response with damping opposite the drivers and a little polywool stuffing in the throat.